Dragon's Triangle (The Shipwreck Adventures Book 2) (25 page)

“You need a lift to shore, buddy?”

“Yes, thank you.” Benny sat on the edge of the fishing boat and swung his legs into the dinghy. He could tell from the man’s voice he was an American.

“Glad to be of help.” The young man nodded. “My name’s Billy, by the way.”

“Nice to meet you. My name is Rafi.”

“Is it okay if I drop you off at the Yacht Club? That’s where I’m headed.”

“Yes. That would be fine.”

Billy revved the engine up and the big inflatable dinghy jumped onto a plane. For the next several minutes the boat dodged between
the moored boats and the engine noise was too loud for them to speak. He throttled down as they approached the beach, and with a flick of a switch the outboard tilted up so the prop wouldn’t hit the bottom. Billy tossed an anchor over the side.

“Sorry, man, we’ve got to wade in from here. It’s not deep.”

Benny followed the American when he slid out of the boat and started walking through the shallows. The young man crossed the sand beach and tied a rope from the dinghy to a palm tree.

Benny shook his hand. “Thank you for the lift.”

“No problem. Want to join me for a cold one? I’ve got a nasty chore to do. Came in to borrow Roger’s phone to call the cops. I think my girlfriend’s sailboat was stolen last night.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m so pissed because I told her I’d watch it for her.” They crossed the concrete slab, dodging between the tables, and sat down on benches at the bar. Benny didn’t say anything. Billy was the sort of man who would keep talking as long as there was silence.

“The boat was right there when I hit the rack around three in the morning. I’d been partying pretty hard, but I wasn’t so drunk I didn’t check. It was there. But I didn’t wake up till almost eight. I couldn’t believe it when I looked outside. Gone.” Billy held up two fingers when the bartender approached. “Beer okay with you?”

“Fine, thanks.”

The bartender set the two cold bottles on the bar and Billy drained half of his right away.

“Hey, you were pretty close by. You didn’t see anything, did you?”

“Maybe,” Benny said.

“Really?”

“I woke up in the dark when I heard the sound of an engine. I saw a white sailboat go by, but it was a woman driving it.”

Billy swung around on his stool and faced Benny. “Really? You’re shittin’ me. She took it out herself?”

“I don’t know who it was,” Benny said. He hoped his new friend Billy would provide him with more information.

“Well, I’ll call her and find out. Hey, Roger, can I borrow your phone?”

The bartender walked toward them and pulled a small cell phone out of his pocket. “Here you go, you cheap bastard. When’re you gonna get your own damn phone?”

“On the salary the owner of that boat pays me? Not likely.” Billy took the phone and punched in a number. He held the phone to his ear and said, “Besides, I’d rather borrow yours and use
my
money for beer.”

Billy frowned. “Hmm.” He punched at the off button. “It went straight to voice mail.” He handed the phone back to the bartender.

Roger said, “You trying to reach Riley?”

“Yeah, I got up this morning and her boat’s gone. I thought it had been stolen. Nearly had a heart attack when I got up.”

“When she rented the mooring here, I think she left the number of her satellite phone, too. Let me look.”

Roger disappeared for a few minutes and when he returned, he had a scrap of paper. He handed it to Billy.

“Thanks, man.”

Roger started toward the other end of the bar, halted, and retraced his steps. He sighed as he handed Billy his phone again.

“I’ll leave you a big tip. I promise.”

The bartender rolled his eyes.

Benny held his breath while Billy dialed the number. The man waited, then his eyes lit up. “Riley! I’m so glad you answered.”

He listened for several seconds. Then he said, “Hey, that’s cool. I’m just glad it was you. I thought your boat had been stolen at first.”

He paused again. “Man, that’s a long trip to make all by yourself.”

Billy nodded as he listened. “I understand. He was your grandfather. I liked it there. I’ve done several races out of the Manila Yacht Club. Listen, this must be costing good beer money. Drop me an email if you ever need me. And I’m sure we’ll cross paths again. The world of boats is like that. Bye.”

Billy dropped the phone onto the bar. “Shit,” he said.

“What’s wrong?”

“That’s a hell of a way to break up with a guy. I’m going to miss that one. Roger! Another round.”

Benny held up his hand. “Not for me. I’ve got to get going. Sorry about your girlfriend.”

Billy reached out and shook Benny’s hand. “Thanks. I’ll be fine. She was a fine woman, but a little weird, too. She was kinda secretive. Like just now, she made me promise not to tell anyone where she’s headed.” Billy shook his head, but then a broad grin split his face. “But it’s not so bad being a single guy again in Thailand.”

Billy high-fived Roger as Benny turned away and started walking out of the Yacht Club.

Patpong
Bangkok, Thailand

November 20, 2012

The taxi dropped Elijah off at the corner of Silom and Patpong Roads. The night market vendors had set up their booths in the street selling T-shirts, jewelry, and knockoff perfume brands. Like in so much of Thailand, even this red-light district didn’t have a clear identity.

Elijah did not understand why the man had asked to meet in such a degenerate part of the city. Patpong—the name alone made him feel nauseous. From the ladyboys to the BJ bars to the promises of a ping-pong show—Elijah knew better than to ask for details on that one—the place was a cross between a third-world Walmart and a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah.

Though it was not yet ten o’clock, the street was crowded with Thai tourists and
farang
men who looked a sickly white in the light from the neon signs.

The mamasan out in front of the Thigh Bar was particularly obnoxious as Elijah approached the door. The old woman grabbed hold
of his arm and screeched so she could be heard over the sound of the hip-hop music pulsating from the speakers overhead.

“Come have a look. You like!”

Elijah wrenched his arm free, but entered anyway, which pleased the old broad. She shouted something at him, but he didn’t understand the words. He didn’t want to, either.

Inside the bar, he saw the usual layout of dancers on poles in the center of the room and the tables for customers around them. The dancers were well lit by spotlights, but the customers were deliberately seated in the shadows. He was there to meet Mr. Black. While Elijah was head of the Philippines section, Black headed up the entire Asia section. Elijah tried not to allow himself to be distracted by the go-go girls.

He felt a tug at his sleeve and turned to see a girl no more than five foot two standing next to him. She wore a fluorescent pink bikini and her unnaturally huge breasts bulged out of the small triangles of cloth.

“Mr. Hawkes?”

“Yes,” he said, but Elijah could not take his eyes off her breasts.

“Follow me.”

She turned and slipped past the crowd of men who had just arrived and were arranging a table close to the dancers. Elijah hurried to catch up with her. As she led him up the stairs his face was mere inches from those smooth, hypnotically swaying cheeks, and he nearly ran into her when she paused at the top. Then she crossed the floor to a black leather booth back in the shadows away from the bar.

Mr. Black sat alone wearing his usual black Nike jogging suit and sneakers. That was all Elijah had ever seen him wear.

“Good evening, Elijah,” he said. “Sit down. Suzie, take his drink order.”

Elijah asked for a scotch on the rocks and watched the girl as she crossed to the bar.

“She’s something, eh? I paid for those tits.”

The man’s words snapped him out of it. The girl, her body—both were less interesting, knowing that God had not made them.

“You said on the phone that we needed to talk,” Elijah said.

“Yeah.” The man drank off the last of the amber liquid and set his glass down hard. “I want to know what the fuck is going on.”

Suzie returned with Elijah’s drink and both men grew silent as they watched her approach. She stood farther away from the table than was necessary just so she had to bend over and reach to place the glass in front of Elijah. When she turned to leave, Elijah took a mouthful of the drink. The whiskey was already watery.

“We’ve run into a few problems,” Elijah said.

“I don’t care about your problems. What I want is results.”

“I understand that.”

“Do you?”

Elijah didn’t answer.

“I’ve set up a meeting for next Monday.”

“With who?”

“It’s our buyer. He’s intrigued by you.”

“Me?”

“You know these foreigners. They’re intrigued by the mystique of the American West, the Gold Rush. He wants to meet you, so I’ve set the meeting at your ranch.”

“Okay.”

“That’s only six days off. Our man from the Company wants to sit in. They like to keep tabs on what we’re up to. You know those Clandestine Services guys don’t like surprises. They expect our guy to report on this Dragon’s Triangle deal. We’ll decide what we want them to know. How close are you?”

Elijah considered the option of telling the truth about losing the documents, then rejected it. “The translation is proving to be more difficult than we expected. It’s wiser to get an exact latitude and longitude
before sending a team up to Aparri. It will save us time and money in the long run.”

“We’re having to dip into our reserves right now, Hawkes. That damn Karzai expects us to show up every week with a bigger and bigger payoff and the whole Arab Spring mess is costing us a fortune.”

“I understand that.”

“I hope you do. You’ve done good work. Until you figured it out, we had plenty of gold in the Philippines, but it took forever to introduce it into the world market. We couldn’t risk having any of these Asian countries asking for their gold back. It was brilliant. When you brought this Dragon’s Triangle thing to us, you made it sound like a sure thing. A win-win. People have made financial and political decisions based on our belief that you, Hawkes, are a sure thing. You’ve always paid off for us in the past, and you’ve made yourself rich in the process.”

“Yes, thank you, sir.”

“Don’t make us regret our confidence in you.”

“I won’t. You can count on that.”

Black slid out of the booth and stood. “I’ll see you at your place, then. I’ll text you the details. Good night.”

“Good night, Mr. Black.”

Subic Bay, Luzon
The Philippines

November 19, 2012

Cole’s taxi pulled up to the gates of the Subic Bay Freeport Zone and the guard on the gate waved them through like the guards always did. Cole wondered for the umpteenth time what purpose the gate served. It seemed that after all those years of having the US Navy operating a massive base here, when it reverted to the Philippines in 1992, they didn’t know how to stop guarding the place. Since lots of expat Americans lived inside the Zone, Cole figured they’d lobbied to turn it into a very large gated community to keep the local riffraff out.

The taxi turned in to the parking lot outside Gama’s Resort and Dive Center. Cole hopped out and paid the driver. His only luggage was the small duffel he had thrown in the backseat.

Walking into Gama’s through the arched colonial-style doors, past the cannons and figureheads and glass cases full of marine artifacts, felt like coming home. He had used the site as his home base for almost two years now, and Cole was delighted he had been able to stop
running at last and get back to work. And at Gama’s, he had found kindred spirits.

Brian, the owner, was sitting in his usual spot at the end of the bar. Behind him, across the terrace covered with dining tables, was a view of the deep blue waters of Subic Bay, where several freighters rested at anchor. Brian raised his right hand with his signature cigarette clutched between two fingers. “John, my boy! I knew you’d make it in time for happy hour!”

The other fellows round the bar laughed. They were mostly American expats, Vietnam vets who’d spent time in and out of Subic or Clark, then came back after the war, married Filipinas, and settled here.